But any writer--what a pretentious term--must admit that he is like the physicist who can never prove anything. He may have intuitive sense, but any claim of his of some holy understanding of the world and people is ridiculous. (Fault holy men and women for establishing such a mistaken pattern.) If he, or she, comes up with anything it will be by dumb luck and coincidence, a matter of looking in the right place at the right time. He can only shrug at the worthlessness of his chosen profession, and wish he had some other sort of job by which to serve mankind more honestly.

This is akin to what Fellini is telling us in "8 1/2," that he, Guido, played so wonderfully by Mastroianni (himself a true hero of art), has been an obsessive fool in his creative mode, various women, Claudia Cardinalle's character, etc., putting up with him, and come up with nothing as far as a film, and that here, only realizing that does he 'get it.' He realizes that people are people, not roles to play. Indeed, Fellini, and Mastroianni, nail it. The modern equivalent of Adam's finger reaching out to touch God's by Michelangelo.

Thus, the squirrelly nervousness and awkwardness, lack of confidence, a pained shyness that mark the life and character of the creative type, even as he is a friendly and generous person (if a bit overly self-protective.) Treated best with yoga and aerobic exercise and some form of job to occupy himself with.

Being down with himself for being who he is isn't much of a solution. What can he do but move forward, hoping that he has helped a few other people understand their own form of the condition, helpless as they are to completely prevent it. That's probably too tolerant a view to take for a lot of people, but... Know thyself--maybe there's enough shame in that already, when you try to become an adult--and you shall understand the Universe.


{INTERLUDE, a good long bike ride in Rock Creek Park on a beautiful day, into evening, as I don't have to tend bar tonight.}

The writer reveals himself not through holiness, but through his own faults.

And in revealing himself, his faults, his foibles, he is bastion and butress of democracy and constitutional liberty, much moreso than the clever moralizing simpleton who would claim perfect strength over his weaknesses. The writer is the first line of defense for freedom and commerce, is both guide and teacher. His is the Western disagreement with moralizing religious law and totalitarianism.

And maybe you can't be a writer until you admit to yourself the uneasy truth of your being a male, a lazy turd, a little brother more irresponsible than he should be, a libertine, etc., etc., etc.

The writer is a democrat, not for following rules so much, even though he would so much like to.

It takes a long time for him to be at peace with his state. Which doesn't get any easier with age, but by some wisdom.

How to fix things? Less Glen Beck, more Shane MacGowan. Is Joyce so far away from Jefferson and Franklin?

If I may say so, trust me, you wouldn't want to be a writer, at least as far as I can tell. However, if called, you don't have much choice, to continue revealing yourself as the awkward and confused person you are where others just know what to do and go do it. Keith Gessen, he's done a fine job with capturing that.

Maybe that's some of the meaning behind the opening of In Our Time, the Nick Adams stories, when Nick trails his hand in the water, quite certain that he would never die. There has to be some basic fallacy of assumptions, otherwise you wouldn't be a writer.

Tolstoy describes his brother, who was not a novelist: "All of the talents. None of the necessary faults."

Once you can understand that, life begins.